Latvian aristocracy. On the origin of Russian noble families from ancient Prussia Confirmation of the baronial title in Russia

Before being included in the lists of nobility, the gentlemen of Russia belonged to the boyar class. It is believed that at least a third of the boyar families came from immigrants from Poland and Lithuania. However, indications of the origin of a particular noble family sometimes border on falsification.

In the middle of the 17th century, there were approximately 40 thousand service people, including 2-3 thousand listed in Moscow genealogical books. There were 30 boyar families who had exclusive rights to senior positions, including membership in the royal council, senior administrative positions in major orders, and important diplomatic appointments.

Discord between the boyar families made it difficult to govern the state. Therefore, it was necessary to create next to the ancient caste another, more submissive and less obstinate service class.
Boyars and nobles. The main difference is that the boyars had their own estates, while the nobles did not.

The nobleman had to live on his estate, run the household and wait for the king to call him to war or to court. Boyars and boyar children could appear for service at their own discretion. But the nobles had to serve the king.

Legally, the estate was royal property. The estate could be inherited, divided between heirs, or sold, but the estate could not.In the 16th century, an equalization of the rights of nobles and boyar children took place.During the XVI-XVII centuries. the position of the nobles approached the position of the boyars; in the 18th century, both of these groups merged, and the nobility became the aristocracy of Russia.

However, in Russian Empire there were two different categories of nobles.
Pillar nobles - this was the name in Russia for hereditary nobles of noble families, listed in columns - genealogical books before the reign of the Romanovs in the 16-17 centuries, in contrast to nobles of later origin.

In 1723, the Finnish “knighthood” became part of the Russian nobility.
The annexation of the Baltic provinces was accompanied (from 1710) by the formation of the Baltic nobility.

By a decree of 1783, the rights of Russian nobles were extended to the nobility of three Ukrainian provinces, and in 1784 - to princes and murzas of Tatar origin. In the last quarter of the 18th century. The formation of the Don nobility began at the beginning of the 19th century. the rights of the Bessarabian nobility were formalized, and from the 40s. 19th century - Georgian.
By the middle of the 19th century. The nobility of the Kingdom of Poland is equal in personal rights with the Russian nobility.

However, there are only 877 real ancient Polish noble families, and there are at least 80 thousand current noble families. These surnames, along with tens of thousands of other similar noble Polish surnames, got their start in the 18th century, on the eve of the first partition of Poland, when the magnates of their lackeys, grooms, hounds, etc. raised their servants to the dignity of gentry, and thus formed almost a third share of the current nobility of the Russian Empire.

How many nobles were there in Russia?
“In 1858 there were 609,973 hereditary nobles, 276,809 personal and office nobles; in 1870 there were 544,188 hereditary nobles, 316,994 personal and office nobles; noble landowners, according to official data for 1877-1878, were counted as 114,716 in European Russia.” Brockhaus and Efron. Article Nobility.

According to the Big Soviet encyclopedia(3rd ed.), in total in the Russian Empire (without) Finland) the big bourgeoisie, landowners, high officials, etc. of both sexes were: in 1897 - 3.0 million people, in 1913 4.1 million. Human. Specific gravity social group in 1897 - 2.4%, in 1913 - 2.5%. The increase from 1913 to 1897 was 36.7%. USSR article. Capitalist system.

The number of nobility (male): in 1651 - 39 thousand people, 108 thousand in 1782, 4.464 thousand people in 1858, that is, over two hundred years it increased 110 times, while the country's population increased only five times: from 12.6 to 68 million people. Korelin A.P. Russian nobility and its class organization (1861-1904). - History of the USSR, 1971, No. 4.

In the 19th century in Russia there were about 250 princely families, more than half of them were Georgian princes, and 40 families traced their ancestry to Rurik (according to legend, in the 9th century called to “rule in Rus'”) and Gediminas, the Grand Duke of Lithuania, who ruled in XIV century in what is now Western Belarus (“Cornet Obolensky” belonged to the Rurikovichs, and “Lieutenant Golitsyn” belonged to the Gediminovichs).

Even more amusing situations arose with the Georgians than with the Poles.

Since in St. Petersburg they were afraid that the princes would again turn to oligarchic freedom, they began to count the princes carefully, namely, they ordered everyone to prove their right to the principality. And they began to prove it - it turned out that almost none of the princes had documents. A large princely factory of documents was established in Tiflis, and the documents were accompanied by the seals of Heraclius, King Teimuraz and King Bakar, which were very similar. The bad thing was that they didn’t share: there were many hunters for the same possessions. Tynyanov Y. Death of Vazir-Mukhtar, M., Soviet Russia, 1981, p. 213.

In Russia, the title of count was introduced by Peter the Great. The first Russian count was Boris Petrovich Sheremetyev, elevated to this dignity in 1706 for pacifying the Astrakhan rebellion.

Barony was the smallest noble title in Russia. Most of the baronial families - there were more than 200 of them - came from Livonia.

Many ancient noble families trace their origins to Mongolian roots. For example, Herzen’s friend Ogarev was a descendant of Ogar-Murza, who went to serve Alexander Nevsky from Batu.
The noble Yushkov family traces its ancestry back to the Horde Khan Zeush, who went into the service of Dmitry Ivanovich Donskoy, and the Zagoskins - from Shevkal Zagor, who left the Golden Horde in 1472 for Moscow and received estates in the Novgorod region from John III.

Khitrovo is an ancient noble family that traces its origins to those who left in the second half of the 14th century. from the Golden Horde to the Grand Duke of Ryazan Oleg Ioannovich Edu-Khan, nicknamed Strong-Cunning, named Andrei in baptism. At the same time, his brother Salokhmir-Murza, who left, was baptized in 1371 under the name John and married the sister of Prince Anastasia. He became the founder of the Apraksins, Verderevskys, Kryukovs, Khanykovs and others. The Garshin family is an old noble family, descended, according to legend, from Murza Gorsha or Garsha, a native of the Golden Horde under Ivan III.

V. Arsenyev points out that the Dostoevskys descended from Aslan Murza Chelebey, who left the Golden Horde in 1389: he was the ancestor of the Arsenyevs, Zhdanovs, Pavlovs, Somovs, Rtishchevs and many other Russian noble families.

The Begichevs were descended, naturally, from the Horde citizen Begich; the noble families of the Tukhachevskys and Ushakovs had Horde ancestors. The Turgenevs, Mosolovs, Godunovs, Kudashevs, Arakcheevs, Kareevs (from Edigei-Karey, who moved from the Horde to Ryazan in the 13th century, was baptized and took the name Andrei) - all of them are of Horde origin.

During the era of Grozny, the Tatar elite strengthened even more.
For example, during the Kazan campaign (1552), which in history will be presented as the conquest and annexation of the Kazan Khanate to the Moscow state, the army of Ivan the Terrible included more Tatars than the army of Ediger, the ruler of Kazan.

The Yusupovs came from the Nogai Tatars. Naryshkins - from Crimean Tatar Naryshki. Apraksins, Akhmatovs, Tenishevs, Kildishevs, Kugushevs, Ogarkovs, Rachmaninovs - noble families from the Volga Tatars.

The Moldavian boyars Matvey Cantacuzin and Scarlat Sturdza, who emigrated to Russia in the 18th century, received the most cordial treatment. The latter's daughter was a maid of honor to Empress Elizabeth, and later became Countess Edling.The Counts Panins traced their ancestry back to the Italian Panini family, which came from Lucca back in the 14th century. The Karazins came from the Greek family of Karadzhi. The Chicherins descend from the Italian Chicheri, who came to Moscow in 1472 in the retinue of Sophia Paleologus.

The Korsakov family from Lithuania (Kors is the name of the Baltic tribe that lived in Kurzeme).

Using the example of one of the central provinces of the empire, one can see that families of foreign origin made up almost half of the provincial nobility. An analysis of the pedigrees of 87 aristocratic families of the Oryol province shows that 41 families (47%) have foreign origins - traveling nobles baptized under Russian names, and 53% (46) of hereditary families have local roots.

12 of the traveling Oryol families have a genealogy from the Golden Horde (Ermolovs, Mansurovs, Bulgakovs, Uvarovs, Naryshkins, Khanykovs, Elchins, Kartashovs, Khitrovo, Khripunovs, Davydovs, Yushkovs); 10 clans left Poland (Pokhvisnevs, Telepnevs, Lunins, Pashkovs, Karyakins, Martynovs, Karpovs, Lavrovs, Voronovs, Yurasovskys); 6 families of nobles from the “German” (Tolstoys, Orlovs, Shepelevs, Grigorovs, Danilovs, Chelishchevs); 6 - with roots from Lithuania (Zinovievs, Sokovnins, Volkovs, Pavlovs, Maslovs, Shatilovs) and 7 - from other countries, incl. France, Prussia, Italy, Moldova (Abaza, Voeikovs, Elagins, Ofrosimovs, Khvostovs, Bezobrazovs, Apukhtins)

A historian who studied the origin of 915 ancient service families provides the following data on their national composition: 229 were of Western European (including German) origin, 223 were of Polish and Lithuanian origin, 156 were Tatar and other eastern, 168 belonged to the house of Rurik.
In other words, 18.3% were descendants of the Rurikovichs, that is, they had Varangian blood; 24.3% were of Polish or Lithuanian origin, 25% came from other Western European countries; 17% from Tatars and other eastern peoples; The nationality of 10.5% was not established, only 4.6% were Great Russians. (N. Zagoskin. Essays on the organization and origin of the service class in pre-Petrine Rus').

Even if we count the descendants of the Rurikovichs and persons of unknown origin as pure Great Russians, it still follows from these calculations that more than two-thirds of the royal servants in the last decades of the Moscow era were of foreign origin. In the eighteenth century, the proportion of foreigners in the service class increased even more. - R. Pipes. Russia under the old regime, p.240.

Our nobility was Russian only in name, but if someone decides that the situation was different in other countries, they will be greatly mistaken. Poland, the Baltic states, numerous Germanic nations, France, England and Turkey were all ruled by aliens.

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List of princely families of the Russian Empire. The list includes: the names of the so-called “natural” Russian princes who descended from the former ruling dynasties of Rus' (Rurikovich) and Lithuania (Gediminovich) and some others; surnames, ... ... Wikipedia

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List of Tatar princely families of Russia. The list includes: two clans (Kochubey and Chingis), elevated to princely dignity in the Russian Empire. They are marked in the list (RI). a few surnames of Tatar princes included in the number of Russian... ... Wikipedia

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List of families of princes of Russia. The list includes: Russian families and persons who received the dignity of princes foreign countries; Russian subjects who bore the title of prince; foreign princes who accepted Russian citizenship; foreign princes,... ... Wikipedia

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Baron Ungern. Daurian crusader or Buddhist with a sword Andrey Valentinovich Zhukov

Chapter 1 Pedigree

Pedigree

... When in 1956, the Soviet leader N.S. Khrushchev was informed that the government of the Federal Republic of Germany was going to appoint a representative of one of the branches of the ancient Ungern family as the first ambassador of the Federal Republic of Germany to the USSR, his answer was categorical: “No! We only had Ungern, and that’s enough!” This historical semi-apocryphal, semi-anecdote indicates that the ancient and extensive Ungern family continues to be part of the political elite of modern Europe, a kind of closed aristocratic club of its most famous families.

However, the history of the family tree of the Ungern barons looks quite confusing and contradictory. This is how it is set out from the words of Baron R. F. Ungern-Sternberg himself by Ferdinand Ossendowski in his book “Beasts, Men, and Gods,” to which we will have to refer more than once: “I come from the ancient family of Ungern von Sternberg, in It mixed German and Hungarian blood - from the Huns of Attila. My warlike ancestors fought in every major European battle. They took part in the Crusades, one of the Ungerns fell at the walls of Jerusalem under the banner of Richard the Lionheart. In a tragic ending crusade children, an eleven-year-old boy, Ralph Ungern, died. When the bravest warriors German Empire were called in the 12th century to protect its eastern borders from the Slavs, among them was my ancestor - Baron Halsa Ungern von Sternberg. There they founded the Teutonic Order, planting Christianity among the pagans - Lithuanians, Estonians, Latvians and Slavs - with fire and sword. Since then, representatives of my family have always been present among the members of the order. In the Battle of Grunwald, which put an end to the existence of the order, two barons Ungern von Sternberg died a heroic death. Our family, which has always been dominated by the military, had a penchant for mysticism and asceticism.

In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, several generations of barons von Ungern owned castles on the soil of Latvia and Estonia. Legends about them still live. Heinrich Ungern-Sternberg, nicknamed the Axe, was a knight errant. His name and spear, which filled the hearts of opponents with fear, were well known in tournaments in France, England, Spain and Italy. He fell at Cadiz from the sword of a knight, who cut his helmet and skull with one blow. Baron Ralph Ungern was a robber knight who terrorized the territory between Riga and Revel. Baron Peter Ungern lived in a castle on the island of Dago in the Baltic Sea, where he pirated, keeping control maritime trade of its time. At the beginning of the eighteenth century, there lived Baron Wilhelm Ungern, well known in his time, who was called nothing less than “brother of Satan” for his studies in alchemy. My grandfather privateered in the Indian Ocean, exacting tribute from English merchant ships. Warships hunted for him for several years, but they could not catch him. Finally, my grandfather was captured and handed over to the Russian consul, who sent him to Russia, where my grandfather was tried and sentenced to exile in the Baikal region...”

Almost literally the same version of the history of the Ungern family is given in his book “God of War - Baron Ungern,” published in 1934 in Shanghai, and A. S. Makeev, who was the baron’s adjutant in Mongolia in 1921. However, many modern historians urge that the works of both F. Ossendovsky and A. Makeev be treated with caution: F. Ossendovsky carefully weaves fiction and his own fantasies into his seemingly documentary narrative about real meetings and personal conversations with Baron. The opinion of the historian of the White movement A.S. Kruchinin, who claims that Ossendovsky’s writings did the memory of Baron Ungern an extremely bad service, seems completely fair. In addition, one should take into account the following fact: Ungern told Ossendovsky the version of his biography that he himself developed for himself, throwing out from the real chain of events individual links that seemed unnecessary to him and did not correspond to the formidable image of the “god of war” he himself created. Accordingly, the resulting gaps were filled with the baron’s own inserts. “One must think that Ungern consciously straightened the space of his semi-legendary genealogy,” the modern Russian writer L. A. Yuzefovich points out in the book “Autocrat of the Desert.” One of these “substitutions and insertions” into a family chronicle was the story of the “pirate grandfather.” In fact, Ungern’s real paternal grandfather served as the manager of a cloth factory in the town of Kertel on the island of Dago (now the island of Hiiumaa, Estonia) until his death and, of course, never “privatered” anywhere.

In fact, Ungern’s great-great-grandfather, Otto Reinhold-Ludwig Ungern-Sternberg, visited India, but not as a pirate, but as a simple traveler. In his youth, he reached the Indian port of Madras, where he was arrested by the British as a “suspicious foreigner” - the Seven Years’ War was going on... Interesting details about the biography of his great-great-grandfather, who received the nickname Bloody, are given in the book we mentioned by L. A. Yuzefovich.

The historical Otto-Rheingold-Ludwig von Sternberg was born in 1744 in Livonia. He received a very good education - he graduated from the University of Leipzig, traveled, and worked at the court of the Polish king Stanislav Poniatowski. He later moved to St. Petersburg, and in 1781 acquired the Hohenholm estate on Dago Island from his schoolmate Count Stenbock. Here the baron lived until 1802, when he was taken to Revel, tried and exiled to Siberia - to Tobolsk, where he died ten years later. There were terrible legends about the baron; rumors about the trial of the “pirate chamberlain” spread throughout Europe. The echoes of these rumors and legends continued to sound almost half a century later. The famous French traveler, Marquis A. de Custine, who left rather scandalous notes about his trip to Russia in 1839, sets out one of the stories that reached him: “I remind you that I am retelling a story I heard from Prince K***:

"Baron Ungern von Sternberg was a man sharp mind, who traveled all over Europe; his character was formed under the influence of these travels, which enriched him with knowledge and experience. Returning to St. Petersburg under Emperor Paul, he fell out of favor for some unknown reason and decided to retire from the court. He settled in a wild land, on the island of Dago, which completely belonged to him, and, insulted by the emperor, a man who seemed to him the embodiment of humanity, he hated the entire human race.

This happened during our childhood. Having shut himself up on the island, the baron suddenly began to show an extraordinary passion for science and, in order to indulge in scientific pursuits in peace, added a very high tower to the castle, the walls of which you can now see with binoculars.” Here the prince fell silent for a while, and we began to examine the tower of Dago Island.

“The baron called this tower his library, and at the top he built a lantern glassed on all sides - a belvedere - either an observatory or a lighthouse. According to his assurances, he could only work at night and only in this secluded place. There he found peace, conducive to reflection. The only living beings that the baron allowed into the tower were his son, still a child at that time, and his son’s tutor. Around midnight, making sure that they were both already asleep, the baron shut himself up in the laboratory; then the glass lantern lit up with such a bright light that it could be seen from afar. This false lighthouse easily misled the captains of foreign ships, who had uncertain memories of the outlines of the formidable shores. Gulf of Finland. It was this mistake that the treacherous baron was counting on. The ominous tower, erected on a rock in the middle of a terrible sea, seemed like a guiding star to inexperienced navigators; relying on a false lighthouse, the unfortunates met death where they hoped to find protection from the storm, from which you can conclude that at that time the maritime police in Russia were inactive. As soon as a ship hit the rocks, the baron went down to the shore and secretly boarded a boat along with several clever and brave servants, whom he kept specifically for such sorties; they picked up foreign sailors floundering in the water, not in order to save, but in order to finish off in the shadow of the night, and then robbed the ship; The baron did all this not so much out of greed, but out of pure love for evil, out of a selfless desire for destruction.

Believing in nothing and least of all in justice, he believed moral and social chaos to be the only state worthy of human existence on earth; in civil and political virtues he saw harmful chimeras, contrary to nature, but powerless to tame it. Having decided the destinies of his own kind, he intended, in his own words, to come to the aid of Providence, which controls the life and death of people.

One autumn evening, the baron, as usual, exterminated the crew of the next ship; this time it was a Dutch merchant ship. The robbers, who lived in the castle under the guise of servants, transported the remains of the cargo from the sinking ship to land for several hours in a row, not noticing that the captain of the ship and several sailors survived and, having climbed into the boat, managed to leave the disastrous place under the cover of darkness. It was already dawn when the baron and his henchmen, not yet completing their dark business, noticed a boat in the distance; The robbers immediately closed the doors to the cellars where the looted goods were stored and lowered the drawbridge in front of the strangers. With exquisite, purely Russian hospitality, the owner of the castle hurries to meet the captain; with complete equanimity he receives him in the hall located near his son’s bedroom; The boy's tutor was seriously ill at that time and did not get out of bed. The door to his room, which also opened into the hall, remained open. The captain behaved extremely imprudently.

Mister Baron,” he said to the owner of the castle, “you know me, but you cannot recognize me, because you saw me only once, and moreover in the dark.” I am the captain of a ship whose crew almost entirely perished off the coast of your island; I regret that I am forced to cross the threshold of your house, but I am obliged to tell you what I know: among those who killed my sailors this night were your servants, and you yourself killed one of my people with your own hand.

The Baron, without answering, goes to the door to the tutor's bedroom and silently closes it.

The stranger continues:

If I talk to you about this, it is only because I do not intend to destroy you; I just want to prove to you that you are in my power. Give me back the cargo and the ship; even though it is broken, I can sail on it to St. Petersburg; I am ready to swear that I will keep everything that happened a secret. If I wanted to take revenge on you, I would rush to the nearest village and hand you over to the police. But I want to save you and therefore I warn you about the danger to which you expose yourself by committing a crime.

The Baron still doesn't say a word; he listens to the guest with a serious, but not at all ominous, look; he asks to be given a little time to think and leaves, promising the guest to give an answer in a quarter of an hour. A few minutes before the appointed time, he suddenly enters the hall through a secret door, pounces on the brave stranger and stabs him to death!.. At the same time, on his orders, the faithful servants kill all the surviving sailors, and silence reigns again in the lair, stained with the blood of so many victims. However, the tutor heard everything; he continues to listen... and does not distinguish anything except the steps of the baron and the snoring of the corsairs, who, wrapped in sheepskin coats, are sleeping on the stairs. The Baron, overwhelmed with anxiety and suspicion, returns to the tutor's bedroom and looks at him for a long time with the greatest attention; standing near the bed with a bloody dagger in his hands, he watches the sleeping person, trying to make sure that this dream is not feigned; finally, considering that there is nothing to be afraid of, he decides to save the tutor’s life.”

In crime, perfection is as rare as in all other areas,” added Prince K***, interrupting the narrative. We were silent, because we were impatient to find out the end of the story. The prince continued: “The tutor’s suspicions arose a long time ago; at the very first words of the Dutch captain, he woke up and witnessed the murder, all the details of which he saw through a crack in the door, locked by the baron. A moment later he was back in bed and thanks to his composure he survived. As soon as the baron left, the tutor immediately, despite the fever that was shaking him, got up, got dressed and, getting into the boat standing at the pier, set off; he safely reached the continent and in the nearest city spoke about the atrocities of the baron to the police. The absence of the patient was soon noticed by the inhabitants of the castle; however, blinded by previous successes, the criminal baron at first did not even think of fleeing; Deciding that the tutor had thrown himself into the sea in a fit of delirium tremens, he tried to find his body in the waves. Meanwhile, the rope coming down from the window, as well as the disappearing boat, irrefutably testified to the flight of the tutor. When, belatedly recognizing this obvious fact, the murderer set out to escape, he saw that the castle was surrounded by troops sent to arrest him. Only one day has passed since the next massacre; At first, the criminal tried to deny his guilt, but his accomplices betrayed him. The Baron was captured and taken to St. Petersburg, where Emperor Paul sentenced him to lifelong hard labor. He died in Siberia. Thus sadly ended his days a man who, thanks to the brilliance of his mind and the casual elegance of his manners, served as the decoration of the most brilliant European salons.”

Thus, the family of barons Ungern entered the annals of world literature. But that is literature. IN real life, as usual, everything was much more prosaic. The baron's ancestors, who lived on the island of Dago, off the coast of which ships actually often crashed, were peaceful and law-abiding people. This is evidenced by the entry that the well-known Leonty Vasilyevich Dubelt, chief of staff of the gendarme corps, made in his diary on May 21, 1853: “On May 14, the English steamer Neptune, which set off from Kronstadt for London, crashed on an underwater rock near the island of Dago. Passengers and cargo, including 50 thousand half-imperials belonging to Baron Stiglitz, were saved. The passengers were received in the most hospitable manner by the landowner Baron Ungern-Sternberg.”

The materials of the trial of Otto-Rheingold-Ludwig Ungern-Sternberg were studied more than two hundred years later, in the 1920s, by the Hungarian researcher Czekei, who discovered that the reason for the baron’s exile to Siberia was a quarrel with a classmate who sold Hohenholm to the baron, at that time - already the Estonian governor-general. In the book “Autocrat of the Desert,” L. A. Yuzefovich cites an excerpt from Chekey’s research: “The Baron was a man of excellent upbringing, well-read and educated... He was a fearless sailor, a knowledgeable and hardworking farmer, an excellent father... He was famous for his generosity and showed concern for his people. In addition, he built a church. He suffered from nostalgia for his former life and was unsociable. The local nobility could not appreciate the baron’s extraordinary personality.” Almost everything that a Hungarian researcher wrote about one of the ancestors of R. F. von Ungern Sternberg in the twenties of the last century could rightfully be attributed to his descendant. Our hero had enough misunderstanding and loneliness during his lifetime, and the misunderstanding continues decades after his death. But first things first. For now, we have to return to the baron’s pedigree.

M. G. Tornovsky, an officer who fought in the division of Lieutenant General R. F. Ungern-Sternberg during the Civil War, who personally knew the baron and left the most interesting memoirs “Events in Mongolia-Khalkha in 1920–1921”, written in Shanghai in In 1942, in particular, he spoke about the works of A. S. Makeev and F. Ossendovsky: “I read 5-6 biographies about General Ungern, but all of them basically did not correspond to the truth. A complete fiction as presented by F. Ossendovsky and copied from him by Esaul Makeev...” The information that M. G. Tornovsky presents in his “Memoirs...” should obviously be considered the most reliable. True, Tornovsky assessed his work very self-critically: “The biography in the variation below is to some extent correct,” he wrote, “but it suffers from a number of “gaps,” which could not be filled in due to the lack of sources or the inconsistency of such.” While in exile in Shanghai, Tornovsky had the opportunity to meet with a distant relative of Baron R. F. Ungern, chamber cadet Baron Reno Leonardovich von Ungern-Sternberg, who was the second secretary of the embassy of the Russian Empire in Washington before the revolution. This meeting most likely took place at the very end of 1940 or in 1941.

Reno Leonardovich von Ungern-Sternberg spent several hours talking with Tornovsky. Their conversation turned out to be very fruitful and was able to clarify many unclear places related to the history of the Ungern family and the biography of Roman Fedorovich himself. This conversation was given particular value by the fact that Reno Ungern von Sternberg turned out to be the holder of the most complete pedigree of the entire Ungern house - “Ungaria”, published in Riga in 1940. The cover of “Ungaria” was decorated with the family coat of arms of the von Ungern-Sternbergs: a shield with lilies and a six-pointed star in the center, topped with a crown and the motto: “Their star knows no sunset.” The information that M. G. Tornovsky gleaned from the family chronicle of the Ungaria house became the basis for writing the most reliable biography of Lieutenant General Roman Fedorovich von Ungern-Sternberg. So, let us turn to the genealogy of the house of von Ungern Sternberg, set out in the “Memoirs...” of M. G. Tornovsky.

“About the beginning of the twelfth century, two brothers of Ungaria moved from Hungary to Galicia. Both married sisters of the Slavic prince Liv. From here came the two oldest families of the Ungerns and the Livins (obviously, more correctly the Lievens. - Note A. Zh.), later the Most Serene Princes. From Galicia de Ungaria and his family moved to the Baltic states. During the ownership of the Baltic States by the Livonian Order, the de Ungarias became barons Ungerns (“Hungarians”), and during the rule of the Swedes in the Baltic States, an obliging historian who wrote a family chronicle added “Starnberg” to the surname, having found some kind of relationship between the Ungaria family and the Czech Count Starnberg.” . Consequently, M. G. Tornovsky concluded, “the main blood of the Ungern family is Hungarian-Slavic. Over time, Germanic and Scandinavian blood was mixed into it in large part.”

During the reign of the Livonian Order in the Baltics, many from the House of Ungern moved to Prussia. During the time of Swedish rule, a number of Ungerns moved to Sweden. Thus, in the history of Prussia and Sweden in the thirteenth to seventeenth centuries, the surname Ungern-Sternberg is found. All people from the House of Ungern belonged to the highest strata of Prussian and Swedish society and occupied very high positions in these countries. The baronial dignity was granted to the Ungern-Sternbergs by the Swedish Queen Christina in 1653. (It is interesting that according to the same Swedish royal charter of 1653, representatives of the Wrangel family were also elevated to baronial dignity, whose descendant, General Baron P. N. Wrangel, was the commander of Baron Ungern during the First World War.) The baronial title denoted the immediate vassal of the monarch In Russia, the title of baron was introduced by Peter I. After the inclusion of the Baltic region into the Russian Empire, the same Peter I issued a decree recognizing the rights of the Baltic nobility and “regarding it as Russian.”

“The founder of the Russian house of barons Ungern-Sternberg was Baron Reno,” Tornovsky further writes. - During Tsar Peter’s conquest of the Baltic states, Baron Reno Ungern provided the Tsar with great assistance in the Russians’ development of the newly conquered region. On the other hand, Baron Reno Ungern negotiated with Tsar Peter many privileges for the region, especially for the nobility. He (Baron Reno Ungern. - Note A. Zh.) was the first leader of the nobility of the Baltic region. Baron Renault had many sons, which is where the large house of the Ungern barons came from. All of them owned significant land in the Baltic States and even islands in the Baltic. Thus, the island of Dago belonged to one of the branches of the Ungern barons. All the Ungern barons enjoyed complete trust and stood close to the throne of the Russian emperors for two centuries, until the very end of 1917. The Ungern barons never held major positions in Russia. They preferred to stay in the Baltic states - on their own land, holding all sorts of positions by election, but some of the Ungern barons served in the army and in the diplomatic corps.” It should also be added that the Ungern-Sternberg barons owned numerous castles in Estonia and Livonia, and their family was included in the noble matrikula (genealogy books) of all three Baltic provinces of the Russian Empire.

In 1910, a major two-volume work by the famous Russian genealogist S.V. Lyubimov, “Titled Clans of the Russian Empire,” was published in St. Petersburg. The books collected information about more than 800 noble families of Russia. Small individual reference articles contained many interesting and important information on genealogy and history of representatives of various noble titled families. When writing this work, S.V. Lyubimov made maximum use of the most valuable sources and literature on the genealogy of the Russian nobility. This unique reference book is valuable primarily because it contains general information about the most famous noble families, collected shortly before 1917, when the history of the Russian nobility ceased to exist for almost many decades.

“The family of barons von Ungern-Sternberg descends from Johann Sternberg, who moved from Hungary to Livonia in 1211,” says the book by S. V. Lyubimov. Lyubimov makes no mention of either Galicia or the daughters of the legendary Prince Liv. The following is said about the baronial dignity of the Ungerns: “By the charter of the Roman Emperor Ferdinand I dated February 7, 1534, Georg von Ungern-Sternberg was elevated, with his descendants, to the baronial dignity of the Roman Empire.

By a charter of the Swedish Queen Christina dated October 2 (17), 1653, Waldemar, Otto and Reinhold von Ungern-Sternberg were confirmed in baronial dignity.

The baronial title of the noble family von Ungern-Sternberg was recognized by the highest opinion of the Council of State on December 20, 1865.” This is the opinion of Russian genealogical science about the origin of the Ungern family. We especially note that in the literature there are different spellings of the Ungerns' full title name: Ungern von Sternberg, von Ungern-Sternberg, or simply Ungern-Sternberg. In accordance with the spelling given in the reference book “Titled families of the Russian Empire,” we settle on the full name of the baron as von Ungern-Sternberg. For convenience, we will also simply call him by the first part of the surname Ungern or Ungern-Sternberg - in this version, the baron’s surname was mentioned in official service records.

Here we need to make some digression in order, on the one hand, to tell the reader about the role played by the German-Swedish nobility in the history of the Russian Empire, and on the other hand, to try to understand the very spirit and atmosphere of the society in which Roman Fedorovich grew up and was brought up. von Ungern-Sternberg.

A wide influx of foreigners, in particular Germans and Swedes, into Russian service began, as is known, with Peter I. At the same time, the lands of the Baltic region, inhabited by Germans and Swedes, became part of the Russian Empire. Soviet historical science, guided by the “only true and correct teaching” of Marxism-Leninism, the main research tool and criterion for evaluating this or that historical event chose the so-called class approach. In accordance with the “class approach” method, the role of the German-Swedish, “Baltsee” aristocracy in Russian history was determined.

The overwhelming majority of Germans and Swedes who swore allegiance to the service of the new fatherland - the Russian Empire - in the 18th century were nobles. And the nobility, in full accordance with the theory of the “class approach,” is a class of oppressors, a purely reactionary class. Among other things, the assessment of the role of the Baltic Germans in Russian history was, of course, affected by the difficult Russian-German relations, which left their mark on the entire 20th century. As a result, the role of the Baltic Germans (in addition to the Germans themselves, they also included Swedish, Scottish and Swiss families in Russian service) in the development of Russian society, army, science, culture, etc. was regarded by Soviet historians as extremely negative. “German dominance”, “Prussian order”, “stick system” - these are just a small part of the definitions that Soviet historians used when considering Russian-German relations.

Only in last years In modern historical literature, a different, more fair assessment of the role of the German-Swedish factor in the development of Russian society, in particular the army and navy, has appeared. Why were the Russian emperors so willing to accept the Germans and Swedes for military service? This tradition was characteristic of both the 18th century and the 19th century, and it was preserved in the first decades of the 20th century. Modern historian Sergei Volkov explains such a pro-German policy by the high professionalism, diligence and discipline of the German and Swedish element: “They were distinguished by high discipline, relatively rarely retired during their service, remained quite united, and many of them had a higher military education.” Former descendants of members of knightly orders were true professionals who deeply absorbed the spirit of many generations of medieval soldiers of Christ.

It should also be noted that the Protestant part of the German and Swedish element in the Russian army was distinguished by high morality, therefore there were practically no scandals associated with their names, especially on the basis of the “women’s issue”. The Germans and Swedes were distinguished from other officers by the so-called Baltic type: restraint, good manners, coldness, sometimes turning into stiffness, the ability to conduct small talk and at the same time “keep their distance.” It should be noted that, contrary to the popular belief about the “rich German exploiters” who allegedly “shamelessly profited from the suffering of the Baltic and Russian peasants,” the majority of the Baltic barons were, despite all their pompous titles, as a rule, in very cramped material circumstances .

The Ostsee residents took the place of the Russian nobles who did not want to serve, who actively used the privileges granted to them in accordance with the first paragraph of the “Manifesto on Liberty for the Nobility” (1762): according to this paragraph, the nobles could, at their own request, withdraw from civil service or even leave Russia (point 4). The pre-revolutionary Russian historian A.E. Presnyakov assessed the role and place of the Baltic nobility in the state system of the Russian Empire as follows: “The environment of the Baltic nobility - with its archaic and monarchical traditions - became especially close royal family during a period of fluctuations in the entire political European world."

Here's how famous artist Alexei Benois describes in his memoirs two typical Baltic Sea officers: “Both (Baron K. Delingshausen and Count N. Fersen) were typical Baltic Sea men, both were very blond, both spoke Russian correctly, but with a slight German accent, both were well-mannered and exquisitely polite... Count Fersen always maintained his distance, which corresponded to his characteristically German, absolutely straight posture, his tall stature and “Apollonian” build.” A. Benoit’s remark about his comrades that “they never fell into gossip” also seems extremely interesting.

It is also necessary to note the high devotion of representatives of the Baltic families to the ruling Romanov dynasty in Russia. The royal dynasty was for them the personification of their own moral and ethical ideals. An officer of the Semenovsky Life Guards Regiment, later Major General A. A. von Lampe, who belonged to the same specific circle as the family of the Ungern-Sternberg barons, wrote after the fall of the monarchy, in 1917: “The country that sheltered my ancestors, has become a real Motherland for me, and so much so that I, like a dying gladiator, am dying, but I send her my last greetings and feed on one hope - my curse to the winner will lead him to defeat, and thus, dying, I will achieve my goal - I will liberate the Motherland ... I gave everything to my homeland..."

Many representatives of the German-Swedish nobility entered into mixed marriages, converted to Orthodoxy and gradually became completely Russified. In 1913, in service in the Russian Imperial Army there were 1543 generals. Of these, 270 people had German surnames. It is interesting that among the generals of German origin there were even more Orthodox Christians than Protestants: 154 and 113 people, respectively. Among them were such Germans and Swedes, “outspoken in their origins,” as Baron P. N. Wrangel (surname of Danish origin, 12th century), whom we already mentioned above, general, future commander-in-chief of the Russian army in 1920; Duke G. N. Leuchtenberg, who became one of the leaders of the monarchist movement in exile; Count F.A. Keller (Swedish origin, 17th century), “the first saber of the Russian army,” hero of the First World War, a convinced monarchist, shot by Petliurists in Kyiv in the winter of 1918; Count A.P. Bennigsen, commander of the Consolidated Cuirassier Regiment in Volunteer Army; Minister of the Household, Earl S. C. Fredericks; commander of the Semenovsky regiment, Colonel G. A. Min, who suppressed the Moscow rebellion with his regiment in December 1905, and later died at the hands of terrorists, and many others. The transition to Orthodoxy was one of the signs of unity and consolidation of the officer corps. However, regardless of religion, the overwhelming majority of officers felt themselves Russian “by oath and duty.”

It was in this “Bestsee environment”, in which the medieval knightly values ​​of duty, honor, and devotion to one’s overlord were cultivated, that the formation of the views and character of Baron R. F. von Ungern-Sternberg took place. In his view, chivalry was, as it were, transformed into officers, inheriting medieval knightly traditions and psychology. Many representatives of the Baltic aristocracy who served in the best guards units of the Russian Imperial Army had ancient Teutonic roots. For example, the count and baronial family of Mengden, one of whose ancestors, John von Mengden, was even the master of the Teutonic Order in Livonia; one of the ancestors of the baronial family of Rosens, Voldemar, was among the knights of the order, and the other, Georg, was a captain of the order; representatives of the count family of Tsege von Manteuffel were associated with the Livonian Order - a branch of the Teutonic Order Holy Virgin Mary in the Baltics. As we remember, one of the baron’s ancestors, Halsa Ungern-Sternberg, was directly related to the Teutonic Order.

It is known that the baron himself was extremely interested in his genealogy. Almost all the officers of the Asian Cavalry Division who served under Ungern (A.S. Makeev, M.G. Tornovsky, V.I. Shayditsky, N.N. Knyazev and a number of others) were, to one degree or another, informed about the family tree of the Ungern house. The Baron often remembered his ancestors even in conversations with random interlocutors, trying to comprehend his own place and role in the Ungern family tree. On September 15, 1921, during a meeting of the revolutionary tribunal in Novonikolaevsk, which was considering the “Case of Citizen Ungern,” to the question of the chairman of the court Oparin, “What distinguished your family in Russian service?” - Ungern replied: “72 killed in the war.” Ungern's ancestors, like representatives of other Baltic families, honestly served the Russian Empire. For their nobility and the privileges associated with it, they paid with the hardest currency - their own blood and life itself.

One of the ancestors of Roman Fedorovich - Baron Karl Karlovich Ungern-Sternberg - served in the Russian army under the command of the famous commander P. A. Rumyantsev, fought under his command in Seven Years' War(1755–1762). After the accession to the throne of Emperor Peter III, he was appointed his adjutant general. K. K. Ungern-Sternberg was one of the persons closest to the emperor. After the death of Peter III as a result of a conspiracy organized by Count N. Panin and the Orlov brothers, K. K. Ungern-Sternberg was dismissed from the court and went to serve in the army. In 1773 he stormed Varna, was wounded and retired. In 1796, the new Emperor Paul I again called into service a close friend of his late father, Emperor Peter III, and promoted him to the rank of infantry general. It is no coincidence that our hero, Roman Fedorovich Ungern-Sternberg, extremely valued Emperor Paul I and honored his memory.

... On April 11, 1762, three months before her accession to the Russian throne, the future Empress Catherine II gave birth to a son, Alexei, from Prince Grigory Grigorievich Orlov. The illegitimate son of the great empress was granted hereditary possession to the village of Bobriki and the town of Bogoroditsk, both in the Tula province. Based on the name of the village, the child was given a surname - Bobrinsky. Alexey Grigorievich Bobrinsky studied at cadet corps, served in the cavalry, traveled. Having retired with the rank of brigadier, he settled in Revel. By imperial decree of November 12, 1796, Brigadier AG. Bobrinsky was awarded the title of Count of the Russian Empire. The decree was signed by Emperor Paul I, half-brother of A.G. Bobrinsky, six days after the death of their mother Catherine II. Count Bobrinsky returned to service, was appointed commander of the 4th squadron of the Horse Guards, and a year later received the rank of major general. Bobrinsky was married to Anna Dorothea (Anna Vladimirovna), the daughter of Waldemar Conrad Freiherr von Ungern-Sternberg - one of the representatives of the extensive Baltic family. There are many notes about Countess A.V. Bobrinskaya, nee von Ungern-Sternberg, in the diaries of AS. Pushkin, and, in particular, this: “Old woman Bobrinskaya always lies for me and gets me out of trouble.”

Another of R.F. von Ungern-Sternberg’s relatives is O.K. von Ungern-Sternberg, hero Patriotic War 1812, lieutenant, later captain of the Life Guards Hussar Regiment. Participated in foreign trips Russian army in 1813–1814, was wounded in the “Battle of the Nations” (Leipzig, 1813). After the war, he commanded the Izyum Hussars and Alexandria Hussars regiments.

In two collections of martyrologies, “Officers of the Russian Guard” and “Officers of the Russian Cavalry,” compiled by historian Sergei Volkov, the names of members of the house of von Ungern-Sternberg - participants in the First World War and the Civil War are given. Let's look at this list:

“Baron Ungern von Sternberg, Mikhail Leonardovich, was born on September 12, 1870. From the nobility... the son of an officer... Colonel, commander of his own E.I.V. convoy. In the Volunteer Army since 1917. Participant of the 1st Kuban (Ice) Campaign, then in the administration of the Kuban Territory. In exile in France. Died on January 15, 1931 in Cannes...”

“Baron Ungern von Sternberg, Rudolf Alexandrovich. Colonel of the Life Guards of the 3rd Artillery Brigade. In exile in Latvia..."

“Baron Ungern von Sternberg Eduard Rudolfovich. Captain of the Life Guards Semenovsky Regiment. Evacuated... from Novorossiysk on the ship "Rus". In exile in Germany..."

“Baron Ungern von Sternberg (Mikhail Leonardovich?). Colonel. In the Don Army, the All-Soviet Union of Socialists and the Russian Army in the Life Guards Ataman Regiment before the evacuation of Crimea. Evacuated on the ship "Tsarevich Georgy".

"Baron Ungern von Sternberg. Headquarters captain of the Life Guards Cavalry Regiment. In the North-Western Army; in May 1919 - commander of the 1st battalion of the Ostrovsky regiment."

“Baron Ungern von Sternberg Alexander Alexandrovich. Officer of the 11th Hussars. In exile..."

“Baron Ungern von Sternberg Vasily Vladimirovich. Cornet. In the All-Soviet Union of Socialists and the Russian Army before the evacuation of Crimea. On December 18, 1920, with the 2nd Cavalry Regiment at Gallipoli."

We see that many loved ones and distant relatives R. F. Ungern took the most active and direct part in the White movement, fighting in its ranks until November 1920, when the remnants of the Russian army under the command of General P. N. Wrangel were evacuated from Crimea by sea.

... Among the 72 relatives of the baron who died on the battlefield for “faith, the Tsar and the Fatherland,” the last was Ungern’s cousin, also Baron Friedrich von Ungern-Sternberg. After mobilization was announced, he joined his cousin in the 2nd Army under the command of General Samsonov, which crossed the Russian-German border in August 1914 and fought in East Prussia. A few weeks later, after grueling battles, Samsonov’s army found itself surrounded by Germans near the East Prussian city of Soldau. Not wanting to survive defeat and captivity, Baron Friedrich Ungern von Sternberg chose to share the fate of his dead comrades and went alone (!) in a suicidal attack under the fire of German machine guns.

Chapter I. Pedigree. years of study...Emperor Alexander III, wanting military valor to bind the army and navy with common remembrances, he ordered the corvette “Vityaz” to be called “Skobelev” from now on. encyclopedic Dictionary Brockhaus and Efron. T. 59. St. Petersburg, 1900, p. 216. Mikhail Dmitrievich